The current issue of The Journal of the American Medical Association includes two articles that review studies of marijuana's medical utility and come to similar conclusions about the applications that are best supported by the existing evidence: treatment of chronic pain, neuropathic pain, and spasticity. There is also substantial evidence that THC, marijuana's main active ingredient, is effective at relieving nausea and restoring appetite.

I don't need researchers to tell me that cannabis extract relieved my father's bone cancer pain. I saw it happen. I saw it work when powerful narcotics that were having terrible side effects did not.

I really don't need drug warriors using the force of law to tell me that it didn't happen. But they continue to do exactly that, and I mean both parties. Obama could have ended the Schedule 1 classification and the Republican Congress could have done it too. Or, they could have done it together.

But denying the medical facts results in more government power over individuals and that's something the Duopoly can always seem to agree on.

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Just like some other DENIAL subjects. Looks like it's more than tobacco that uses the same technique. Looks like Corporations do whatever they want to make a buck, they say 'fuck you' to the sick people.

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Just like some other DENIAL subjects. Looks like it's more than tobacco that uses the same technique. Looks like Corporations do whatever they want to make a buck, they say 'fuck you' to the sick people.

Speaker Sam Rayburn called for the bill to be passed on "tellers". Does everyone know "tellers"? Did you know that for the vast bulk of legislation in this country, there is not a recorded vote. It is simply, more people walk past this point than walk past that point and it passes -- it's called "tellers".

They were getting ready to pass this thing on tellers without discussion and without a recorded vote when one of the few Republicans left in Congress, a guy from upstate New York, stood up and asked two questions, which constituted the entire debate on the national marijuana prohibition.

"Mr. Speaker, what is this bill about?"

To which Speaker Rayburn replied, "I don't know. It has something to do with a thing called marihuana. I think it's a narcotic of some kind."

Undaunted, the guy from Upstate New York asked a second question, which was as important to the Republicans as it was unimportant to the Democrats. "Mr. Speaker, does the American Medical Association support this bill?"

In one of the most remarkable things I have ever found in any research, a guy who was on the committee, and who later went on to become a Supreme Court Justice, stood up and -- do you remember? The AMA guy was named William C. Woodward -- a member of the committee who had supported the bill leaped to his feet and he said, "Their Doctor Wentworth came down here. They support this bill 100 percent." It wasn't true, but it was good enough for the Republicans. They sat down and the bill passed on tellers, without a recorded vote.

In the Senate there never was any debate or a recorded vote, and the bill went to President Roosevelt's desk and he signed it and we had the national marijuana prohibition.

Sorry, I meant to say it was an almost non-existent problem before the government got busy "solving" it, they put almost no thought into it, and they lied about what little evidence was considered.

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Just like some other DENIAL subjects. Looks like it's more than tobacco that uses the same technique. Looks like Corporations do whatever they want to make a buck, they say 'fuck you' to the sick people.

The big pharmaceutical companies cringe at the thought of the average joe being able to grow effective pain killers in their own backyard.

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Just like some other DENIAL subjects. Looks like it's more than tobacco that uses the same technique. Looks like Corporations do whatever they want to make a buck, they say 'fuck you' to the sick people.

The big pharmaceutical companies cringe at the thought of the average joe being able to grow effective pain killers in their own backyard.

Umm... wait a minute. Once again it appears that government is the problem here, not any private company. With typical coherence, they bought a patent for medical use of something that their law declares medically useless.

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He tried to tell them that researchers can access marijuana as easily as they can Schedule 2 drugs.

Unfortunately for him, there was a researcher sitting right there who knew that he could get any Schedule 2 drug any time with no trouble but had a LOT of trouble getting hold of marijuana for research.

So he tried to distract and deflect, as big government fans do when caught lying.

But in the end the voters do and even Bloomberg can't buy every outcome he wants.

We keep voting drug warriors into office at every level. Are corporations making us do it? Are union$?

In the end, we're doing it to ourselves and we can stop. No, RedTuna, we probably can't restore whatever Republic you envision, but we can stop at least some of the insanity.

No corporation can reschedule marijuana and no union can either. Obama could. Congress could. They would if we really wanted them to.

Disagree. There are "people" who make too much $$ on keeping the WOD going. The "people" who Obama and Congress answer to won't allow it. And no, I'm not talking about the kind of "people" who can actually vote.

Sometimes being the key word. I would bet $$ to donuts that money matters more often than not. If that were not true, I doubt that either side would be spending well north of a billion $$ each on the Prezzy race.

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And virtually none of it will be spent trying to get voters on the basis of ending prohibition. Because prohibition is still pretty popular with the Duopoly. People are noisy as hell about topics they care about.

Now it's time for this thread to drop like a stone again to illustrate my point.

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And virtually none of it will be spent trying to get voters on the basis of ending prohibition. Because prohibition is still pretty popular with the Duopoly. People are noisy as hell about topics they care about.

Now it's time for this thread to drop like a stone again to illustrate my point.

What struck me about that one was the remark from the Sheriff at the end. He apparently would not be troubled by the presence of whatever PTSD drugs were destroying this guy's liver around kids, but is very disturbed that he was growing a safer and effective medicine around his kids. Does he think they were giving him gumdrops or something?

But there is a lag between when weirdos start talking about an idea and when the public accepts it. There's another lag between when the public accepts a new idea and when our leaders followers adopt it in law.

That's why California is pursuing another ballot initiative about marijuana. Political leaders followers are not ready. The polling has to go a little higher before anyone but a weirdo libertarian will try to get those votes.

According to the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, Wolf and his fellow Democrats "warned that prices would rise as private businesses sought profit." In other words, private merchants will jack up prices because they want to make money—unlike the Pennsylvania Liquor Control Board (PLCB), which seeks only to raise revenue. If you think those two motives sound pretty similar, you are smarter than Pennsylvania's governor, who fails to recognize that the relevant difference between these two models for distributing booze, when it comes to how high prices can be raised, is the presence or absence of competition.

This fails to recognize that businesses are fundamentally evil, as is profit, but politicians are fundamentally good, as is tax revenue.

It's not hugely surprising that the candidates that are able to garner the most votes are generally also the ones able to get financial support.

You know, there is a thread that is more directly about $peech and you're kind of ruining my point about complete disinterest in the drug war by bumping this one. Have you got any thoughts on this topic? If not, hope to see you over there.

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that is some funny shit coming from the guy who can figure out a way to make just about any thread about guns.

But, on topic. Yes drug prohibition is stupid and thankfully is at the beginning of the end it appears.

I'd just like to point out that we went 23 posts before anyone mentioned guns.

And the "anyone" wasn't me.

Do you plan to vote for Duopoly candidates and their drug war in the coming election? I don't.

When no amount of money can buy them your vote because of this issue, they'll change positions.

Having been a drug war opponent for decades, I don't really see us at the "beginning" of the process. I see a slow process that is going on more slowly than my body is aging. I don't expect to live to see legalization, at least not at the federal level.

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“In July of 2012, a civil forfeiture notice was taped to our front door, and we were shocked,” says Harborside founder Steve DeAngelo, “because our model has always been about legal compliance and responsibility."

...

“Nobody, including U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag, has ever made any allegation that Harborside has violated California laws regarding cannabis—nobody,” states DeAngelo plainly.

“In July of 2012, a civil forfeiture notice was taped to our front door, and we were shocked,” says Harborside founder Steve DeAngelo, “because our model has always been about legal compliance and responsibility."

...

“Nobody, including U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag, has ever made any allegation that Harborside has violated California laws regarding cannabis—nobody,” states DeAngelo plainly.

Well, if a corporation can be considered a "person" for certain things, why not property? In fact, I don't understand why property can be charged with a crime while a corporation cannot. Makes no sense to me. Its just the opposite, in my mind. Property cannot act or make decisions. A corporation can. Corporations commit crimes everyday.

Notably, the Tri-County Task Force never made a single arrest. The task force countered that assertion, claiming they passed on intelligence that led to over 200 arrests made by other agencies. But a representative from the DEA said, “There’s no way we can validate those numbers. We have no idea what they are basing those numbers on.” Tellingly, “the task force did not document the names of the 200 people who were arrested,” according to The Miami Herald.

Thanks to the commissions from money laundering, the task force could indulge in a lavish lifestyle. Officers enjoyed $1,000 dinners at restaurants in the Miami area, and spent $116,000 on airfare and first-class flights and nearly $60,000 for hotel accommodations, including stays at the Bellagio and the Mandalay Bay in Las Vegas and El San Juan Resort & Casino in Puerto Rico. Police also spent over $100,000 on iPads, computers, laptops and other electronics, bought a new Jeep Grand Cherokee for $42,012 and even purchased $25,000 worth of weaponry, including FN P90 submachine guns. (Bal Harbour, a seaside village of 2,500 residents known for having the nation’s top sales-generating mall, reported just one violent crime in 2012.)

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It took 13 years for the United States to come to its senses and end Prohibition, 13 years in which people kept drinking, otherwise law-abiding citizens became criminals and crime syndicates arose and flourished. It has been more than 40 years since Congress passed the current ban on marijuana, inflicting great harm on society just to prohibit a substance far less dangerous than alcohol.

The federal government should repeal the ban on marijuana.

...

We recognize that this Congress is as unlikely to take action on marijuana as it has been on other big issues. But it is long past time to repeal this version of Prohibition.

Not long ago, you could only read such a thing from insignificant libertarian corporations like REASON, much like advocacy for gay marriage and 2nd amendment rights.

I'm glad to see the Johnny-come-lately heavy hitters like the NY Times Corp $peak out on these issues. It would be nice if they called out Obama as well as Congress. I looked into drug rescheduling a while back and came away with the impression that either Congress or the President could unilaterally reschedule marijuana. The links were lost with the disappearance of the Americans Terribly and Systematically Misled About Marijuana thread.

The implication of the NY Times Corp's last sentence is that Obama would legalize marijuana if only the do-nothing Congress would let him. That ignores his record of enforcement against cannabis dispensaries and the continued federal war on pot under his administration, as well as the fact that he has the power to reschedule marijuana and admit that it has medical uses.

It's the do-nothing Duopoly. What the NY Times Corp is asking them to do is give up some power. You don't get that by asking. You get it by voting differently.

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...Wilson, now a program associate at Californians for Safety and Justice, was married to Dan Niemi, a San Leandro police officer who was shot and killed while on duty in 2005. Wilson says that at the time, she was a conservative who believed in how the U.S. criminal justice system worked. But although her husband's killer was caught and convicted—he's now awaiting the death sentence (a fact which Wilson says brings her no joy now, though she pushed for it during his sentencing)—coming to terms with Niemi's death eventually changed Wilson's perspective. "I was really wrong about how our system works," she told the crowd yesterday.

The then-23-year-old who shot her husband, Irving Ramirez, had been in and out of incarceration since he was young, mostly for drug charges such as meth possession. When Niemi showed up about a noise complaint, Ramirez was on probation—and carrying two handguns and some drugs; he shot her husband because he didn't want to go back to jail.

At first wondering why he was ever let out in the first place, Wilson now wonders why he had to go in. "I can't help but think how my life would be different, and my children's lives would be different... had we passed Proposition 47 years before," she said, referring to the California ballot measure passed in November 2014 that reduced most "nonserious and nonviolent property and drug crimes" from felonies to misdemeanors.

"I don't think that anyone can tell me that had we invested in people over prisons, my husband wouldn't be here today."

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"You can't fight markets," says David Shirk, associate professor of international relations and director of the Justice in Mexico project at the University of San Diego. "When a market reaches a certain size, you can't fight it."

Joe Garcia, a deputy special agent with the Department of Homeland Security and head of the San Diego Tunnel Task Force, would beg to differ. He and his colleagues have spent much of their careers doing just that, discovering more than 200 drug tunnels under the California-Mexico border since the inception of the task force in 1990.

"We want to make it so unattractive to do the type of work that they do, that they'll go somewhere else," says Garcia.

Garcia and his team are skilled at discovering tunnels and filling them up and have garnered favorable local press coverage on a number of big drug busts. But despite these high-visibility wins for Garcia's team, a recent report from the California Attorney General's office paints a picture of a California-Mexico border that's leakier than ever and reports that California has surpassed Texas as the nation's top methamphetamine entry point.

"For every mile of fencing we put up, for every extra thousand or ten thousand border patrol agents that we throw into the area, there's always some trafficker or some organization out there who's figuring out how to maneuver around those obstacles," says Shirk, who contributed to the Attorney General's report.

Garcia acknowledges that the team's initial approach felt a lot like "playing whack-a-mole," with a new tunnel popping up every time they shut an old one down. So, the team shifted its strategy and began targeting the heads of the organizations funding the tunnels, which reflects a broader shift in the U.S. war on drugs. Government efforts to systematically eliminate cartel leaders promptly destabilized the region and led to some of the worst bloodshed in the country's history.

"It was when the government decided to take on drug traffickers that the drug war became a literal war," says Shirk....

You can fight markets and make quite a career of it. You just can't WIN.

But since winning would destroy job security, maybe that's a feature, not a bug, in the system.

Plug a tunnel, another appears. Stop a SCUBA smuggler, they'll use a different boat, submarine, airplane, whatever.

Go after the leadership, new cartel leadership appears. Quite possibly more dangerous than the last batch.

Mr. Garcia's stated goal is that smugglers "go somewhere else." Ummm... as long as smugglers go, they are going to be able to make money in their market. Their market is here. There is no "somewhere else" there are only different ways of getting here.

The best we can do would be to make a legal route/method more attractive in the market. But Puritan Republicans are terrified that someone will use a drug other than alcohol, the only drug that doesn't destroy lives and deserves legal protection in a market. Democrats are afraid those Republicans will call them soft on crime and that Mr. Garcia's union will be unhappy. So we'll never end this stupid drug war.

The only winners will continue to be smugglers with high black-market profits and drug warriors working for governments.

When the Campaign to Regulate Marijuana Like Alcohol in Massachusetts unveiled the text of its 2016 legalization initiative this month, the group highlighted several features of the measure but omitted the most interesting one. The Regulation and Taxation of Marijuana Act would allow consumption of cannabis products on the premises of businesses that sell them, subject to regulation by the state and approval by local voters.

That's a big deal, because until now no jurisdiction has satisfactorily addressed the obvious yet somehow touchy question of where people can consume the cannabis they are now allowed to buy. The legalization initiatives approved by voters in Colorado, Washington, Oregon, and Alaska all promised to treat marijuana like alcohol, which implies allowing venues similar to taverns where people can consume cannabis in a social setting. Yet all four states say businesses that sell marijuana may not let customers use it on the premises.

Sounds like a good idea to me but I doubt the feds will tolerate it. Still too many drug warriors in high places.

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Basically, much better than the drug warriors predicted, but not without problems. One of the things that turns out to have been needed is more new rules, specifically on edibles.

Those are good rules. They remind me of the Pure Food and Drug Act of 1903, the only drug control law in our country that has ever reduced addiction. It worked by informing people of what was actually in "snake oil" and when they found the answer was morphine, they made different choices.

Rules that empower consumers by giving them information on edibles were a good idea and I'm glad Colorado opted for more big government rules in that area.

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What medications have you been taking that were prescribed to you by your doctor?

I will just say that I tried and failed on 19 different pharmaceutical drugs. I’ve been a brain injury survivor for 25 years; I’ve tried everything there is. My doctors gave me megadoses of seizure medications. A medication that was normally prescribed to take 900mg… I was prescribed to take 4800mg a day. It’s not like like my doctors were trying to kill me, they just didn’t have the answers. They thought perhaps a higher dosage would control my condition better, but in fact it just ended up causing more damage.

I don’t blame any of my doctors; they were simply uninformed. I had to take this alternative treatment trial with cannabis independently. My doctors weren’t able or educated enough to tell me to do it. That’s what I think is sad; our medical professionals just don’t know or aren’t legally allowed to tell their patients about medical cannabis.

No known medical use my ass.

We know about medical uses but the drug warriors can't let go of their Reefer Madness-based fears.

Marijuana – scientific name “cannabis” – performed like a champ in the first-ever placebo-controlled trial of the drug to treat Crohn’s Disease, also known as inflammatory bowel disease.

The disease of the digestive tract afflicts 400,000 – 600,000 people in North America alone causing abdominal pain, diarrhea (which can be bloody), severe vomiting, weight loss, as well as secondary skin rashes, arthritis, inflammation of the eye, tiredness, and lack of concentration.

Smoking pot caused a “complete remission” of Crohn’s disease compared to placebo in half the patients who lit up for eight weeks, according to clinical trial data to be published the journal Clinical Gastroenterology and Hepatology...

Schedule 1 drugs like cannabis are supposed to have no known medical use and a high potential for abuse.

The list of medical uses known to doctors and libertarians continues to grow. Regrettably, I have personal knowledge of the fact that alcohol abuse is MUCH worse than cannabis abuse from observing people close to me.

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I don't like private prisons because I don't think a business should have an incentive to want people locked up. To me, that's one of the less important reasons to oppose the stupid war on some drugs.

A friend recently pointed out to me that a state-run prison will probably have a powerful union and that union will view more prisoners as job security. Basically, the same perverse incentive as exists in private prisons.

I haven't figured out why, but I still think locking people up should be a strictly government function. But he did make a good point and I'm still thinking about it.

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Not a lot to think about Tom. Must be a graph out there somewhere to plot the rise of private prisons and the increase in prisoners? I've been sipping moonshine, so I'll step away from the keyboard on that one.

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So you are casually indifferent to the human cost of these things or just blinded by your ideology? I mean - every fuckwhit knows there's pot and there's other drugs and only a disingenuous troll would link say, heroin, to weed.

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So you are casually indifferent to the human cost of these things or just blinded by your ideology? I mean - every fuckwhit knows there's pot and there's other drugs and only a disingenuous troll would link say, heroin, to weed.

I agree that drug warriors are disingenuous trolls for putting both heroin and marijuana in Schedule 1. They're saying that marijuana has no known medical use against a mounting pile of evidence that it is medically useful and they are saying it has a high potential for abuse, higher than Schedule 2 drugs like cocaine, morphine and many other powerful drugs.

It's too bad that they act this way, but there's nothing wrong with pointing out that the two are linked in our laws.

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“Marijuana is dangerous. It certainly is not as dangerous as other Schedule I controlled substances; it’s not as dangerous as heroin, clearly, but it’s still dangerous. It’s not good for you. I wouldn’t want my children smoking it. I wouldn’t recommend that anyone do it. So I don’t frankly see a reason to remove it. We, by the way, support, and have supported, a lot of legitimate research on marijuana, fully behind that; I think it’s great. If we come up with a medical use for it, that would be wonderful. But we haven’t.”

The truth is that the DEA has always fought against research on the medical uses of cannabis plants and the Schedule 1 classification is part of what helps them to prevent research in this country. Luckily, countries like Israel are not so irrational about this particular plant and research goes on there. We know that it's better than pharmaceutical alternatives at preventing seizures, we know it reduces intraocular pressure in glaucoma patients, we know that it stimulates appetite and helps prevent nausea in chemo and other patients, and I have seen with my own eyes how it relieved my father's pain from bone cancer when powerful opiates were failing at that job and only serving to cause constipation.

But we'll elect another Demopublican drug warrior anyway and we'll continue to get lying appointees like this one anyway.

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So you are casually indifferent to the human cost of these things or just blinded by your ideology? I mean - every fuckwhit knows there's pot and there's other drugs and only a disingenuous troll would link say, heroin, to weed.

I agree that drug warriors are disingenuous trolls for putting both heroin and marijuana in Schedule 1. They're saying that marijuana has no known medical use against a mounting pile of evidence that it is medically useful and they are saying it has a high potential for abuse, higher than Schedule 2 drugs like cocaine, morphine and many other powerful drugs.

It's too bad that they act this way, but there's nothing wrong with pointing out that the two are linked in our laws.

So - once again you choose to respond disingenuously. Is it pathological with you? Is this some crusade? Why is it ever little political internet shithole has someone fulfilling the same role?

I'm aware of opium, yes, grumpy. Even been to places where it was de facto legal. Didn't seem really a great solution to me. Also known people who've died from drug problems. legalizing wouldn't have changed that.

That alcohol has very high social costs isn't news to me either. I wasn't commenting on that at all.

meth/ice - now there's a fine ruiner of lives, property and communities.

So you are casually indifferent to the human cost of these things or just blinded by your ideology? I mean - every fuckwhit knows there's pot and there's other drugs and only a disingenuous troll would link say, heroin, to weed.

I agree that drug warriors are disingenuous trolls for putting both heroin and marijuana in Schedule 1. They're saying that marijuana has no known medical use against a mounting pile of evidence that it is medically useful and they are saying it has a high potential for abuse, higher than Schedule 2 drugs like cocaine, morphine and many other powerful drugs.

It's too bad that they act this way, but there's nothing wrong with pointing out that the two are linked in our laws.

So - once again you choose to respond disingenuously. Is it pathological with you? Is this some crusade? Why is it ever little political internet shithole has someone fulfilling the same role?

meth/ice - now there's a fine ruiner of lives, property and communities.

How about crack? Seems silly little political internet shithole needs to get a grip...

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So you are casually indifferent to the human cost of these things or just blinded by your ideology? I mean - every fuckwhit knows there's pot and there's other drugs and only a disingenuous troll would link say, heroin, to weed.

I agree that drug warriors are disingenuous trolls for putting both heroin and marijuana in Schedule 1. They're saying that marijuana has no known medical use against a mounting pile of evidence that it is medically useful and they are saying it has a high potential for abuse, higher than Schedule 2 drugs like cocaine, morphine and many other powerful drugs.

It's too bad that they act this way, but there's nothing wrong with pointing out that the two are linked in our laws.

So - once again you choose to respond disingenuously. Is it pathological with you? Is this some crusade? Why is it ever little political internet shithole has someone fulfilling the same role?

...

No, my response is accurate. If knowing and stating facts about the war on some drugs is pathological to you, I guess your weird definition fits me. Yes, it is a sort of a crusade. I was committed to ending the drug war before I saw how cannabis oil helped my father when he was dying of bone cancer. What I saw increased my resolve and it does have a spiritual component now, so I guess it is a crusade. In answer to your last, I'm not sure why you are here.

Not a lot to think about Tom. Must be a graph out there somewhere to plot the rise of private prisons and the increase in prisoners? I've been sipping moonshine, so I'll step away from the keyboard on that one.

The increase in prisoners has also likely significantly contributed to the US's drop in violent crime since the 70s & 80s. I do agree with Tom that low level pot users don't need to be locked up. I would prefer we reserve that space for real violent criminals and folks who abuse gun rights.

Below is a list of 42 studies showing that marijuana cures cancer, categorized by the type of cancers being cured in each study. This extensive list only includes articles from credible scientific journals. It is important to note that we're not only talking about reducing the side effects of chemotherapy, we're talking about completely curing the cancer itself!

In the past year, cannabis extract has helped him with his cancer. Relieved pain better than anything the doctors gave him, plus helped his appetite and ability to sleep. He reported weird dreams.

So for those who may be on this road, here's what to do. You get a pound of weed (be careful, but it won't be hard to do.) Get a gallon and a half of 191 proof grain alcohol. Blend the cannabis to dust, mix with booze, stir, and strain. Boil the alcohol out of the mixture. You'll have gooey tar. A blob the size of a grain of rice will do wonders.

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So you are casually indifferent to the human cost of these things or just blinded by your ideology? I mean - every fuckwhit knows there's pot and there's other drugs and only a disingenuous troll would link say, heroin, to weed.

Did you happen to follow the link in post 37?

The former head of the DEA thought heroin and marijuana are equally dangerous. Such agency heads serve at the pleasure of the President. So if her views displeased Obama, he could have fired her for being such a fuckwit.

Replacing Michele Leonhart, who had incredibly laughable views, Acting Administrator Chuck Rosenberg claimed that “heroin is probably not more dangerous than marijuana.”

Even as Mr. Obama expressed guarded support for allowing states to experiment with legalizing marijuana, Ms. Leonhart has remained a staunch opponent. She refused during a 2012 hearing on Capitol Hill to say whether she believed that marijuana was less dangerous than crack cocaine, methamphetamine or heroin, saying that “all illegal drugs are bad.”

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They're checking "private" medical records just to see whether someone has committed a crime. Because, you know, checking such things without reasonable suspicion is OK in the context of the drug war.

The problem is this: The medical board has authority to issue “administrative subpoenas,” as they’re called, because it’s in the business of administering the medical industry. The DEA isn’t. It’s in the business of criminal investigations, which can be hindered by the Fourth Amendment.

...Bennett and Walters' reasoning is impeccable: If there were no heroin, no one would be using it. "The heroin epidemic is inflicted upon us by criminal acts that produce an abundant supply of inexpensive drugs," they write. "Stopping these criminal acts will stop the epidemic."

Sounds simple, doesn't it? But while it is easy enough to "attack the supply," it is quite a bit harder to have a noticeable impact on it. You might surmise as much from the fact that the government has been attacking the supply of heroin since 1914, but the drug has never been cheaper or more plentiful.

The basic problem, as drug policy scholars such as Peter Reuter have been explaining for years, is that imported drugs acquire most of their value after arriving in this country. Hence seizing them en route or destroying them at their source does not impose much of burden on traffickers, who treat such losses as a routine cost of doing business. Since the cost is low compared to the street value, its impact on the retail price (or on purity) is generally imperceptible. That means throwing more money at attacking the supply is a highly inefficient way of discouraging consumption.

But Bennett and Walters—who served in the first and second Bush administrations, respectively—claim their supply-side approach was successful. Is that true? Not according to a 2013 analysis by Dan Werb of the Urban Health Research Initiative in Vancouver and four other researchers. "Between 1990 and 2007," Werb and his colleagues reported in the online journal BMJ Open, "the purity of heroin and cocaine, and the potency of cannabis herb, in the US increased, while the inflation-adjusted and purity-adjusted retail street prices of these three drugs declined."

In August, researchers announced they had genetically engineered yeast to produce the powerful painkiller hydrocodone. Now comes the perhaps inevitable sequel: Scientists have created yeasts that can make important constituents of marijuana, including the main psychoactive compound, tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC.

Synthetic versions of THC are available in pill form under brand names like Marinol and Cesamet; they are generally used to treat nausea, vomiting and loss of appetite caused by H.I.V. infection or cancer chemotherapy. Genetically modified yeast could make THC in a cheaper and more streamlined way than traditional chemical synthesis.

Using yeast could also shed light on the clinical usefulness of cannabis-derived compounds. Marijuana is increasingly embraced as medicine, yet there is limited evidence that it is effective against many of the conditions for which it is prescribed. Researchers hoping to separate fact from wishful thinking will need much better access to marijuana’s unique constituents. Modified yeast may provide them....

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It amazes me how little traction this thread gets and how the gun threads generate page after page day after day. The low hanging fruit in stopping gun violence, or any violence, is ending the stupid war on drugs. It is the war on drugs, more than any other thing, which contributes to:

1) conflicts between the police and community

2) high incarceration rates for the poor, which disproportionately affects African Americans and Hispanics

3) which then results in dead ending any escape of poverty for those who carry the scarlet letter of a drug conviction

4) gang and turf wars over territory which then catches innocent people in the crossfire

5) the money which drives illegal trafficking in arms which then flood the battlefield in the war on drugs

This, of course, does absolutely nothing to address the aberrations and outliers in gun violence which capture all the headlines, but it would actually save a lot of lives, would result in an improved quality of life for tens of millions of people, would offer a path out of poverty for millions of people who are trapped there, and offer the type of hope that chokes off the feed pump to gang violence. It would not just be "doing something" it would be doing something positive that would benefit all of us, or at least all of us who do not derive power and wealth from continuing this stupid unwinnable war.

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It amazes me how little traction this thread gets and how the gun threads generate page after page day after day. The low hanging fruit in stopping gun violence, or any violence, is ending the stupid war on drugs. It is the war on drugs, more than any other thing, which contributes to:

1) conflicts between the police and community

2) high incarceration rates for the poor, which disproportionately affects African Americans and Hispanics

3) which then results in dead ending any escape of poverty for those who carry the scarlet letter of a drug conviction

4) gang and turf wars over territory which then catches innocent people in the crossfire

5) the money which drives illegal trafficking in arms which then flood the battlefield in the war on drugs

This, of course, does absolutely nothing to address the aberrations and outliers in gun violence which capture all the headlines, but it would actually save a lot of lives, would result in an improved quality of life for tens of millions of people, would offer a path out of poverty for millions of people who are trapped there, and offer the type of hope that chokes off the feed pump to gang violence. It would not just be "doing something" it would be doing something positive that would benefit all of us, or at least all of us who do not derive power and wealth from continuing this stupid unwinnable war.

I would add to your list:

6) erosion of privacy rights. The drug war has set numerous precedents unfavorable to our rights when it comes to permissible searches, technologies for surveillance and their (lack of) oversight, etc.

7) erosion of property rights. As detailed in the FAIR Act thread.

But the drug war concentrates power in government and provides a profit center for private prisons, law enforcement unions, and other interest groups.

As for the lack of interest, it's hard to get partisan Dems interested in reducing government power, especially when there's a D in the White House and we're talking about devolving that power all the way down to the individual, not just a lower level of government. So that leaves partisan Republicans, who sometimes like reducing government power but can't stand it if someone smokes a joint instead of drinking a shot of liquor.

So if you take away the partisan Dems and partisan Repubs from this place, what are you left with? Me, mostly.

But you said the G-word, so maybe this thread will attract some interest now and maybe people will stop voting for drug warriors. And maybe I'll start reeling in a fish with every cast. Hey, it COULD happen.

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It amazes me how little traction this thread gets and how the gun threads generate page after page day after day. The low hanging fruit in stopping gun violence, or any violence, is ending the stupid war on drugs. It is the war on drugs, more than any other thing, which contributes to:

1) conflicts between the police and community

2) high incarceration rates for the poor, which disproportionately affects African Americans and Hispanics

3) which then results in dead ending any escape of poverty for those who carry the scarlet letter of a drug conviction

4) gang and turf wars over territory which then catches innocent people in the crossfire

5) the money which drives illegal trafficking in arms which then flood the battlefield in the war on drugs

This, of course, does absolutely nothing to address the aberrations and outliers in gun violence which capture all the headlines, but it would actually save a lot of lives, would result in an improved quality of life for tens of millions of people, would offer a path out of poverty for millions of people who are trapped there, and offer the type of hope that chokes off the feed pump to gang violence. It would not just be "doing something" it would be doing something positive that would benefit all of us, or at least all of us who do not derive power and wealth from continuing this stupid unwinnable war.

I would add to your list:

6) erosion of privacy rights. The drug war has set numerous precedents unfavorable to our rights when it comes to permissible searches, technologies for surveillance and their (lack of) oversight, etc.

7) erosion of property rights. As detailed in the FAIR Act thread.

But the drug war concentrates power in government and provides a profit center for private prisons, law enforcement unions, and other interest groups.

As for the lack of interest, it's hard to get partisan Dems interested in reducing government power, especially when there's a D in the White House and we're talking about devolving that power all the way down to the individual, not just a lower level of government. So that leaves partisan Republicans, who sometimes like reducing government power but can't stand it if someone smokes a joint instead of drinking a shot of liquor.

So if you take away the partisan Dems and partisan Repubs from this place, what are you left with? Me, mostly.

But you said the G-word, so maybe this thread will attract some interest now and maybe people will stop voting for drug warriors. And maybe I'll start reeling in a fish with every cast. Hey, it COULD happen.

Your additions are certainly valid, and while I am doubtful of it happening any time soon, I am hopeful one day that enough people will see the plainly obvious that we can stop this stupid war.

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I just sent in my petition to amend the FL Constitution the other day.

We need this issue in the state constitution as much as we needed pregnant pigs or some of the other foolishness, but it is a way around intransigent Duopoly politicians who just won't give up power any other way. So I did it, though I disagree with it. I hope enough FL voters will do the same to put legal cannabis in our constitution, but we'll still have the even more intransigent problem of the federal government's prohibition.

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I just sent in my petition to amend the FL Constitution the other day.

We need this issue in the state constitution as much as we needed pregnant pigs or some of the other foolishness, but it is a way around intransigent Duopoly politicians who just won't give up power any other way. So I did it, though I disagree with it. I hope enough FL voters will do the same to put legal cannabis in our constitution, but we'll still have the even more intransigent problem of the federal government's prohibition.

Kind of how I felt about how they got our enhanced pre-emption passed, of course it was tossed by a judge later.

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It amazes me how little traction this thread gets and how the gun threads generate page after page day after day. The low hanging fruit in stopping gun violence, or any violence, is ending the stupid war on drugs. It is the war on drugs, more than any other thing, which contributes to:

1) conflicts between the police and community

2) high incarceration rates for the poor, which disproportionately affects African Americans and Hispanics

3) which then results in dead ending any escape of poverty for those who carry the scarlet letter of a drug conviction

4) gang and turf wars over territory which then catches innocent people in the crossfire

5) the money which drives illegal trafficking in arms which then flood the battlefield in the war on drugs

This, of course, does absolutely nothing to address the aberrations and outliers in gun violence which capture all the headlines, but it would actually save a lot of lives, would result in an improved quality of life for tens of millions of people, would offer a path out of poverty for millions of people who are trapped there, and offer the type of hope that chokes off the feed pump to gang violence. It would not just be "doing something" it would be doing something positive that would benefit all of us, or at least all of us who do not derive power and wealth from continuing this stupid unwinnable war.

Because here in Merica we wouldnt think of legalizing something that we cant make some money on. The way the sell pot out west that shit costs double what the same shit costs on the street hence the underground is as strong as it ever was.

Most you could ever hope for is users get a free ride. Dealers are still going to go to jail just like they do in europe. So what do you have then? Near as i can tell free needles for the asking and the junkies dont go to jail. Sounds like San Fran to me

Unachievable utopia

There are lots of legal things that people make money on. I make money writing software. I would suggest that if someone wants to buy or sell drugs, they should be allowed to, just like I am allowed to charge someone for writing software. No jail.

If someone wants to sell drugs, they should at the least have to say what it is they are selling. The Pure Food and Drug Act of 1903 worked then and works now. It is our only drug control law that has ever reduced addiction.

It's very problematic for cannabis. Hand me a bag and I can sniff it and pretty much tell you what it is in terms of variety, potency, how it was grown, how it was cured. Hand me one of the edible products and I have no idea what you have handed me. And even "pretty much" is not an acceptable standard for something like pain killers. I want to know how many milligrams and what the chemical compound is. So is "pretty much" OK for one but not another? It is to me but is something that I can see creating problems in courts.

...Now, the other fact that I think that is so interesting about drug addiction at the turn of the century, as opposed to today is who the addicts were, because they were the exact opposite of who you would think most likely to be an addict today. If I were to ask you in terms of statistical groups who is most likely to be involved with drugs today, you would say a young person, a male, who lives in the city and who may be a minority group member. That is the exact opposite of who was most likely to be addicted to drugs at the turn of the century.

In terms of statistical groups, who was most likely to be addicted to drugs at the turn of the century? A rural living, middle-aged white woman. The use of morphine in medical operations does not explain the much higher incidence of drug addiction among women. What does is the second cause of the high level of addiction at the turn of the century -- the growth and development of what we now call the "patent medicine" industry.

I think some of you, maybe from watching Westerns on TV if nothing else are aware that, again, as late as 1900, in areas, particularly rural areas where medical resources were scarce, it was typical for itinerant salesmen, not themselves doctors, to cruise around the countryside offering potions and elixirs of all sorts advertised in the most flamboyant kinds of terms. "Doctor Smith's Oil, Good for What Ails You", or "Doctor Smith's Oil, Good for Man or Beast."

Well, what the purveyors of these medicines did not tell their purchasers, was that later, when these patent medicines were tested, many of them proved to be up to fifty percent morphine by volume.

Now, what that meant, as I have always thought, was the most significant thing about the high morphine content in patent medicines was it meant they tended to live up to their advertising. Because no matter what is wrong with you, or your beast, you are going to feel a whole lot better after a couple of slugs of an elixir that is fifty percent morphine. So there was this tendency to think "Wow! This stuff works." Down you could go to the general store and get more of it and it could be sold to you directly over the counter....

That's one problem. Another is the sheer temptation to dilute/cut drugs.

If you're going to sell distilled alcohol, you have to put the proof on the label. Alcohol is expensive to produce. Water is not. Greedy people would be tempted to water it down a bit. Maybe not even enough for the consumer to notice, but enough to give a competitive advantage.

Basically, the problem with relying on self-interest to regulate things is that sometimes self-interest encourages bad behavior.

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Perhaps cognizant of the fact that most Americans support legalization and that most Republicans support a federalist approach to the issue, Christie tried to soften his hardline stance by claiming "I'm not against medical marijuana." But as Scott Shackford noted last night, Christie opposed his state's medical marijuana law (which was signed by his predecessor), dragged his feet in implementing it, and vetoed legislation designed to ease access for patients younger than 18. As recently as June 2014, Christie called medical marijuana programs "a front for legalization."

Furthermore, as Rand Paul pointed out during the debate, Christie as president would override the medical marijuana law he now claims to support as governor. Federal law makes no distinction between medical and recreational use, and Christie has said he would enforce federal law. Among other things, that means raiding the "alternative treatment centers" that supply marijuana to New Jersey patients, seizing the properties, and prosecuting the people who run the centers for multiple felonies. Given Christie's warning that Coloradans will no longer be able to smoke pot under his administration, his crackdown might even mean arresting patients for possessing a plant that New Jersey recognizes as a medicine but the federal government does not.

Jeb Bush, who unlike Christie says states should be free to set their own marijuana policies, also suggested that he supports access to the drug for bona fide patients. Although he opposed a 2014 Florida ballot initiative that would have legalized medical use, Bush said, he supported a law authorizing the use of low-THC, high-CBD cannabis oil as a "last resort" for patients with epilepsy or cancer. That program, assuming it's implemented, will not help patients with other conditions or patients who need THC for symptom relief. Still, it's telling that pretty much everyone (including former drug czar Bill Bennett) feels compelled to support some kind of access to cannabis-based medicine, a policy that has long been favored by a large majority of Americans.

...

It's good to see them having to run from what they did as Governors at least a little bit.

I'd like to tell JEB that by the time you get to that last resort, you're already using far more dangerous drugs that are legal under federal law. Unfortunately, that's from my list of things I know, but should not.

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If someone wants to sell drugs, they should at the least have to say what it is they are selling. The Pure Food and Drug Act of 1903 worked then and works now. It is our only drug control law that has ever reduced addiction.

It's very problematic for cannabis. Hand me a bag and I can sniff it and pretty much tell you what it is in terms of variety, potency, how it was grown, how it was cured. Hand me one of the edible products and I have no idea what you have handed me. And even "pretty much" is not an acceptable standard for something like pain killers. I want to know how many milligrams and what the chemical compound is. So is "pretty much" OK for one but not another? It is to me but is something that I can see creating problems in courts.

I don't disagree. I would be in favor of labeling and regulation along the lines of alcohol and tobacco, at least for the most part. I would like to see violations of taxes on those items, or any recreational drugs, to be simple civil matters and not see folks violently arrested for selling them without the right tax stamp. It is the criminal records that create the trap for people. I only want folks who are violent or thieves to have those types of records. I don't think anyone should get the scarlet letter for selling pot or for selling loose cigs or cigs without the right tax stamp.

Earlier this school year, a sixth-grader in the gifted-and-talented program at Bedford Middle School in Bedford, Virginia was suspended for one year after an assistant principal found something that looked like a marijuana leaf in his backpack.

The student, the 11-year-old son of two school teachers, had to enroll in the district's alternative education program and be homeschooled. He was evaluated by a psychiatrist for substance abuse problems, and charged with marijuana possession in juvenile court. In the months since September, he's become withdrawn, depressed, and he suffers from panic attacks. He is worried his life is over, according to his mother, and that he will never get into college.

The only problem? The "leaf" found in the student's backpack wasn't what authorities thought it was -- it tested negative for marijuana three separate times.

For those who don't know, recreational drug users throw away the leaves or cook with them. They're not the fun part. A quarter pound or so of them might get you high if you could contrive a way to consume that much quickly. So even if it was a pot leaf, it was nothing to fear. Pretty much how I view the whole plant.

But it wasn't. So they're fucking with this kid just because they're ignorant and fearful.

They are wrecking drug war myths pretty frequently out there these days.

My take: they could have done this sooner and by a larger margin by LOWERING the taxes. The taxes and regulations are high/stringent enough that a significant black market still exists. If they finished getting rid of it by lowering taxes more they would most likely rake in more tax dollars. It's a funny paradox. A real Laffer.